The cost of mediation depends on how much work you do to prepare for your sessions so that you are using your time wisely for the process of mediation. Sessions cost $250 per hour, with an additional $300 fee for the preparation of the Memorandum of Understanding. Sometimes I can adjust the fees if clients demonstrate need.

It’s quite possible for clients who are organized and ready to negotiate to complete mediation in only 3 or 4 sessions. Parenting plans and spousal support each usually take at least one session. This is still less than the $2000 or $3000 retainer that most lawyers require to start a case.

Divorcing partners can reduce the number of mediation sessions they need by having their financial information organized.

Examples of this information would include:

financial affidavits

mortgage information

vehicles (owned, leased, financed)

values of investment accounts

banking information

properties owned

credit card debts

As the mediator, I will build the financial picture of your marital assets and liabilities along with the budgets that you each prepare through your financial affidavits. If you have concerns about issues of spousal support or child support, please know that these issues will be negotiated and resolved once the entire financial picture and individual needs are understood. The new guidelines for spousal support and child support take many factors into consideration and you can depend on the process of mediation to sort it all out.

For questions or to schedule an appointment, please call Diana at 630.479.4676

Links for Illinois Dissolution of Marriage and Child Support Resources

When I’m hanging upside from an aerial yoga hammock (that’s me, in the gray shirt on the right), I could groove in that state of bliss for hours on end. It’s an incredibly peaceful experience. I attended a workshop with Aviana Aerial Yoga at the Abhyaasa Yoga Studioin Naperville, IL. What a lovely studio.

My quest for the upside down started last year, January 2015. I just suddenly decided that I need to learn how to do a headstand. From there, it went to arm balances, and handstand practice. Of course, there are still lots of things I have to learn. There are tons of people more skilled than I am. To dwell on that would cause me to miss the point of the experience. What I loved was the rush I got from an incredible sense of accomplishment and confidence that I couldn’t get from anything else. I loved how I felt, and I wanted more!

I was excited to try aerial yoga because I was intrigued by the hammock. I really had no idea what to expect other than to have some fun.

What I learned was so much different from what I had anticipated.

Surrender to serenity

In aerial yoga, one learns connection with the self. For me, it was a process of surrender. I’ve been supporting myself and two kids on my own for the past 20 years without a break. Being strong meant to keep going, keep pushing through each day, working, going to school, getting my career, keeping up the house, taking care of the kids, the dog, and so on.

I can’t tell you how many times I wished for someone to carry me for a while, to take care of me so that I could curl up into a little ball, and get some rest.

Awareness of bliss

During the aerial yoga practice, I let go of supporting myself and I learned to trust the hammock to support me. Body awareness, breath, and deliberate movements instill confidence in the physical self that translate into the mind, emotions, and thoughts. I learned that I was safe to let go, both literally and figuratively, and just allow myself to be supported. To hang upside down, fully supported, and just let go of the world around me was one of the most blissful experiences I had ever known.

Yes you can

Many people look at aerial yoga, see the hammock, and think it is inaccessible to them because they do not have the supposed strength or skills to participate. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are things you can accomplish more easily because of the hammock. You can let go of your worries and just be at one with the hammock. You can enjoy all the different ways to explore your mind, body, and shifts in energy.

Who knows?

I would encourage you to take an aerial yoga class, and open the door to your own peaceful, fun, uplifting experience. Think of how that can translate into how you handle the hassles of daily living. Perhaps you’ll learn to slow down. Perhaps you’ll say yes when someone offers you help. Perhaps you’ll find that the space in your chest that lets you breathe more easily also helps you be more patient with your loved ones.

Who knows? There’s only one way to find out!

Namaste

Diana

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.

So much is going on in the world today that it can be overwhelming. In the meantime, you’re just trying to get through your day and deal with your own problems and issues.

It’s very common for people to internalize how they feel, stuffing their emotions. People get mad at themselves for continually to engage in this unproductive cycle.

Within each of us is an instinct, a knowing, a gut feeling….something that tells you what you should really do, or a hesitation that says, “Don’t do that. Wait.”

Slow Down and Listen

If you slow down, pause, and listen to that voice or that feeling, you will engage your power of choice. You have the power to choose your actions regardless of whatever anxious thought, stress, or bad feeling is happening inside of you. Slow down and be mindful of your choices. Give yourself options that can take you in the direction of your health, safety, and wellness. This can lead to positive influences on your relationships and your quality of life.

Pick One

Embrace your power to choose wisely. Pick one area of your life in which you want to make healthier choices, such as eating better, exercising, advocating for yourself, walking away from a toxic relationship, getting organized, or other exploring something that you’ve always wanted to do.

Awareness and Choice

Become aware of what you want and what you don’t want. Take advantage of your ability to say yes to yourself, and say no to unhealthy situations. You will survive the temporary discomfort and grief of walking away from disappointment and toxicity. Most importantly, you will stop disappointing yourself, and you will find greater satisfaction in a life where you value yourself.

Move Forward

Use your power to choose something good for yourself today. You are your own greatest source of power. Ask for help if you need it. That’s OK. It’s all about making choices that help you balance, focus, and achieve your goals.

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.

How we talk to ourselves about the passage of time can set up limitations that can make it difficult to bounce back from challenges more quickly.

For example, if you are working on weight loss and tell yourself, “Well, I really blew it with lunch today. There goes my whole week”, then you might decide to give up on your week, eat poorly, and wait until the following week to start over again.

People can risk gaining weight during the rest of that “bad week” and feel very demoralized by the scale when they weigh in.

If you have a “moment”, or a “day”, rather than a “week”, then you quickly get back on track with those healthy eating and exercise habits.

Having a rough moment lets you move on quickly to the next moment where you can bounce back, and make a healthier choice. You’re not trapped in the prison of waiting a whole week to get back on track.

How you talk about time can impact your weight loss!

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.

]]>Take Control for Healthy Habitshttp://dianazilly.com/lifestyle/from-chaos-to-control-how-getting-organized-can-improve-your-healthy-habits
Wed, 06 Jan 2016 13:00:56 +0000http://dianazilly.com/?p=2622What does getting organized have to do with eating and exercise?

It’s all about gaining a sense of control over yourself and your environment. Chaos engenders a loss of control, which can trigger the sympathetic nervous system. This is the “fight or flight” response that causes you to act out and fight, or run away and avoid things. Create order out of chaos and you will start to feel better and get the energy you need to take more positive steps in your life.

Lots of people will experience “Non-Scale Victories” before they see gains in their eating and exercise patterns.

You might get the urge to clean your desk, file paperwork, open those old, unpaid bills, or do a big closet cleaning before you see gains in your health habits.

When you take control over things in your immediate environment, you are giving yourself a chance to feel the authentic control that comes from inside of you. It’s that internal locus of control that will give you the ability to make more healthy choices.

Get organized and feel better!

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.

Have you ever wanted to make an important change in your life but you were afraid you might fail?

Have you ever hidden what you were doing so that, in case you failed, no one would even know about it and you could avoid feeling ashamed or embarrassed?

The uncertainty of life can make you want to stay inside your safe cocoon of predictability in order to avoid the pain of possible failure.

It can be about as darn scary as the idea of falling off a steep rock face!!! (hence the photo for this article…)

Defining Failure

It is natural to want to avoid unpleasant things, especially when it comes to a sense of failure because this can be a threat to a person’s sense of self.

Who wants to sign up to be a failure?

NOBODY! That’s who!

Success and failure are polarizing words that can make you feel anxious and stressed. They are high stakes words that do not allow for anything other than complete success or complete failure.

Remove the anxiety from your attitude and become more resilient in your mindset.Be prepared to keep bouncing back from challenges and disappointments.

Create a more open sense of what success means to you. Learn to see that there can be many possibilities that show up along your pathway of success.

Redefine “failure” to become more of an informative learning process rather than a demoralizing experience.

Use your values to define what success means to you. For example, if money or status are the only ways that you define success, then that only leaves you the option of being a failure if you run short on money or lose a notch of your status.

If you use your values, such as being an honest person, having a strong work ethic, always making an effort, then you will find a lot more peace of mind knowing that, no matter the outcome, you have continued to do the best you can.

Success can come to mean that you lived according to your values and, because of this, there are many rewarding, satisfying outcomes.

Stay Open to the Process

Your mind is your most powerful asset. Learn to use a more open, dynamic, responsive mindset to interpret what happens in your life. If something doesn’t work out the way you had expected, take the information from that experience and learn from it. Open your eyes to the other possibilities in your life. Don’t treat the experience as a failure. Think of it the same way that you would have to turn your car around at the end of a dead end street. Just turn around and head down another street that is taking you in the same general direction that you originally desired. We all have to modify our plans, respond to changes in our environment, and deal with things that are outside our control.

Follow your values and stay open to all the possibilities of life!

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.

This sounds like a conflicting topic however the spirit of what you will read is intended make your life more simple and balanced.

The content of this post came to me while I was in the middle of a two hour workout this morning, and I was possessed to stop short of the third hour to begin writing (the arm balances and headstands will have to wait!)

I connected with the idea of pain knowing that I would be a little sore tomorrow but I really wanted to work on some goals. I thought about all of the people I know who are working on their goals, whether they are related to work, weight loss, fitness, anxiety, or other personal or professional struggles. I accepted the idea of pain and thought, “Pain is part of the development of any goal, whether it is physical, mental, emotional, professional, or other.” Change brings about disruption, reorganization, and a return to balance. Pain will dissipate, pleasure can be sensed, and a balance will be created.

However, the expectations that we build around the perception of the change can hinder our ability to actually become resilient and peaceful. This is where people get stuck, and experience anxiety.

Expectations

So many times we enter a situation or challenge anticipating either the best or the worst to happen. This is a normal aspect of the human condition since the nervous system and its cascade of thoughts, physical reactions, and emotions are arranged to react to danger, chaos, and enemies, and also to seek out safety, order, control, and love.

What we must remember is that the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system are meant to BALANCE each other out, not CANCEL each other out.

By the same token, we often have expectations about a situation where we think, “This is going to be terrible and painful” or “this is going to be perfect and wonderful” because we are trapped in the on/off switch of polarized, black or white, all or nothing, pain or pleasure, good or bad thinking.

We develop expectations that validate whatever has been our most familiar experience (even in terms of how we are accustomed to thinking and perceiving a situation).

Negative thoughts, although unproductive, are familiar.

Familiar equals predictable which means control.

However, the cycle of threat/alert/react keeps you trapped inside the loop and you can’t get a chance to test the reality of the situation.

Breaking Out of the Cycle

Acceptance means that we stop struggling with the idea that we must get rid of pain in order to have pleasure, or that we cannot experience pleasure because there is pain. Sometimes we think that we will never experience anything “good” because there has only been an experience of “bad”.

The body already knows that there will always be both pain and pleasure. The body has a middle ground, a resting point, where there is equilibrium and balance between pain and pleasure.

The body is already in acceptance. The body knows peace.

To allow the mind to find acceptance means to expect that there will be struggles and discomfort in life, along with happy times, and exhilarating times.

Peace is in the middle to balance it all out.

To find balance in the midst of life’s challenges is to observe the landscape of your thoughts, emotions, reactions, and perceptions and discover that there is room for all of the pain, pleasure, and peace in each situation.

Finding the Middle

Easier said than done, finding the middle takes diligent practice.

At first, the initial pattern of reaction to a perceived threat will elicit stress responses.

The idea of calming down will be rejected at first because this is perceived as unsafe, such as lowering your guard in the middle of a fist fight.

Calming down seems too passive and unrealistic. You’re not ready to let go of the fight and just give up and let go because that does not seem to solve anything.

Also, if you have been stressed and anxious for a long time, feeling calm and peaceful does not even seem attainable.

Perfection is viewed as a threat because it is unattainable because it does not exist.

Therefore, what is left is failure, pain, and heartache. This has been experienced and validated, and seems real.

The middle, peaceful place is the balance between the ideas of perfection and failure.

…the IDEAS of perfection and failure…

When you can realize that thoughts are just that, ideas…thoughts…mental constructs….then they can be transformed at your will to reflect the middle ground of reality which acknowledges and balances out perfection and failure.

ACCEPT that both ideas of perfection and failure exist, just as pain and pleasure exist.

ACCEPT that there is also a safe resting point right in the middle that mediates those two polarities.

When you let yourself create resilient thoughts that accept both perfection and failure, fear and courage, pleasure and pain, then you become more powerful and see many solutions to solving the problems of life’s challenges.

Peace does not magically eliminate pain or pleasure but it gives us a place to find balance between the two experiences in order to cope with the challenges of life.

The next time that you need to find the middle, begin by taking these steps:

1) Make a list of your fear-based thoughts, emotions, and imagined outcomes. What needs are being met?

2) Make a list of your perfection-based thoughts, emotions, and imagined outcomes.

3) Ask yourself to identify more balanced thoughts, emotions, and outcomes that are available to meet your instinctive needs of health and wellness.

4) Notice if you are making a fear-based decision instead of listening to what you know is instinctively well for your mind and body to meet your needs authentically.

LISTEN TO YOUR HEART’S DESIRE

When you can come to a place of balance, you are better able to listen to and follow your heart’s desire. We often hold back on pursuing what we want out of fear. Your instincts tell you what you need to be healthy and well.

Courage comes from being able to overcome fear and act on what you know in your gut you need to do.

Your mind and body will have a louder voice that you can follow more easily when you can spend some time in the middle, in peace.

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.

When you think about changing your eating habits, that’s usually a time when you think about missing out on your favorite foods.

It can be really hard to let go of a favorite food when you know that you’re going to miss it, even when you know you’re better off for giving it up.

The idea of giving up a food can bring about feelings of what I call “anticipated deprivation”….the thoughts, feelings, and reactions surrounding how you predict you will feel when you don’t have that favorite food anymore.

The deprivation can even be about your relationships and how you will cope with social occasions, or wondering how other people will react to your changes.

What Can You Do?

Remember You Have Choices

The concerns that you have about anticipated deprivation are normal and real. However, you can also imagine other thoughts, feelings, and reactions that you can have. You can also imagine other people’s reactions differently.

Imagine choices are like furniture in a room.

Imagine that one chair represents the negative, worrisome thoughts that you’re having.

You’re staring at the chair, and your back is turned to all the other furniture in the room.

The other furniture represents the other thoughts, feelings, and reactions that you can have.

Even though you are staring at the negative chair, the other chairs and furniture still exist.

Just like the chairs, you have a room full of other thoughts, feelings, and reactions available to you.

Turn Around and Look

Take some time to meditate and consider some of the other thoughts, feelings, and reactions that you can have that might be more neutral, or even more positive.

Even if you can’t imagine a believable positive option, then look for the middle….a more balanced approach.

It’s OK if you can’t believe positive things yet because you’ve had too much evidence to the contrary…to negative things.

Finding the middle can mean something like telling yourself, “Even though I might feel a bit anxious, I can handle my emotions and find a way to deal with it.”

Have some options available for when you get a strong reaction to missing a food so that you have some planned “go-to” ways of coping, such as calling a friend, taking a walk, cleaning a closet, or doing something fun (a hobby or enjoying nature).

Other People’s Comments

It’s really normal to worry about how to deal with other people’s comments that can be very unsupportive and even destructive. Just remember that there can be other outcomes, and you have choices about how you can respond.

When it comes to other people’s comments or lack of support, you can plan some responses that can help neutralize the interaction and turn the conversation to other topics. Imagine and rehearse things you can say that will help you just steer the conversation.

Simple comments such as “Thank you for noticing” and then pay the person a compliment and ask them an open ended question (maybe about their job, family, or hobby).

Remember to be proud of yourself, and stay strong in your conviction of having a healthier lifestyle. You can cope better when you give yourself lots of options!!!

I’ve always heard people talk about the challenge of quitting those evening snacks. It’s usually one of the first things that people want to quit when they are working on weight loss and emotional eating goals.

A common thread among most evening snackers is that the person feels an URGE to eat.

What causes this urge, you ask?

Let me share….

Classical Conditioning

In classical conditioning, a neutral thing become paired with a naturally occurring stimulus/response set to the point where the neutral thing is no longer neutral but carries the power of the stimulus….and the stimulus no longer needs to be present.

WHAT?

OK, so this is like when a dog hears you go into the kitchen and he immediately gets excited because he thinks he’s going to get food, only the food has not yet made an appearance.

The dog naturally reacts to food. Food is the stimulus. The kitchen was neutral until the dog learned that his food comes from the mysterious place that the humans always go to after dinner to get snacks…..

Now, the dog associates anything going on in the kitchen with food.

You experience the same thing when you sit down on the couch to watch television in the evening. The couch and television were once neutral until you started to pair them with the pleasure that you get from eating snacks. Now, each time you sit down on the couch to watch tv in the evening, you want snacks.

Patterns of the Past

I’ve often heard people talk about the patterns of eating that they acquired in their family of origin, or throughout the course of a marriage. People bond socially over food, and food is often a language of love and comfort. It can also be a source of guilt if one chooses not to join the other person in their eating (peer pressure). I’m only scratching the surface here, but you get the idea.

There are also patterns that form just from visual cues, situations, other people, the environment (such as being in the living room sitting on the couch).

Breaking an eating habit such as evening snacking requires changes in these cues, such as sitting in a different place in the room, or not watching television but finding other things to do….spy on yourself and see what changes you can make in order to break the patterns of these cues.

Also, think about the social and emotional bonds that you might have formed over food. I’ve heard of people choosing to play a game of cards or walk the dog rather than eat snacks. They are still bonding socially, just not bonding over food.

Eating Emotions

If you are a person who, as they read this, thinks, “No, the urge to eat is much stronger than that, to the point where it’s uncontrollable,” then you may be dealing with some other issues more related to anxiety. If you have read other articles on this website, you might recall reading about how food is one of the very first ways that we seek autonomy as an infant. You are driven on a primal level to eat, and to have control over the physical process of eating. You put the food into your own mouth. That’s control.

In the experience of anxiety, one feels a need to control in order to feel safe. If a person is experiencing binge eating, there is most likely a trauma history (neglect, abuse, etc.) and also anxiety. This is treatable and you can get better.

A lot of times people binge eat in the evening when the house is quiet and they are in bed, alone with their thoughts. Sometimes the urge wakes them up after a short period of sleep, or in the shower. These are times when the anxiety sneaks up and demands control, triggering an eating response.

A person might binge eat when they are bored, or when no one is around. A person does not have to be doing binge/purge (when the person makes himself vomit). Many times, people binge and do not purge.

Theses are only a couple of reasons why people snack in the evening. If you are struggling with this issue, just start out by taking note of your thoughts, emotions, physical sensations, and the intensity of the urge. It will help you to build awareness of the issue so that you can choose the next step, whether it is setting up a different evening routine, or getting help from a mental health professional (like me!)

Life is filled with risk and uncertainty. It’s all around us. Everyone experiences some type of risk or uncertainty on a daily basis, whether it’s wondering if the day is going to go as planned, worrying about the kids coming home safely, or hoping that a loved one stays in your life rather than dealing with the pain of a break up.

Why is it hard to deal with uncertainty?

As human beings, we are naturally wired to want connection, attachment, and safety. Our big human brains watch out for harm, and search to organize how we understand our lives in order to feel safe.

You have probably heard of “the comfort zone”. You probably have one! The problem is that the comfort zone is not so comfortable. It’s usually a place that is uncomfortable yet familiar. As human beings, we like “familiar”. It feels safe because it is predictable.

Personal growth is usually uncomfortable and comes from a place of uncertainty. It can require the release of old ways of thinking and feeling, and old ways of how a person once understood the world around him.

The process of change is normally accompanied by the fear of the unknown. There is a sense of empty space that must be filled by something, which is often quickly occupied by self-doubt, fear of failure, fear of discomfort or pain, and even of sense of loss over what one used to think was right….where all the answers once lived.

How to Cope….Where are the Answers?

A New Template

A template, in this context, is a mental map of understanding and organizing the self and its surroundings. Basically, your world view and how you think about your sense of self, your values, your relationships, and how you find meaning in your life.

You cannot use an old template that came from old ways of thinking in order to emerge into healthier habits and patterns.

Your new template must contain the map of where you are now, and the things that you are learning about yourself. It must contain the things that you have come to know about yourself, such as your values. These values may include (for example) health, wellness, responsibility, trust, and self-actualization.

Self-actualization is the process of becoming your own true self, and living to your own fullest potential. It means that you can start to trust yourself about certain areas of your own personal health and well-being, and continue to build upon that.

Using the Open Hand

In Buddhism, there is the practice of the Open Hand in which one understands that the hand must be open to both give and receive.

Know that as you process your uncertainty, the release of the old template that contained your doubts, fears, and negativity will make space for your ability to receive the joy, happiness, and peace of mind that comes from using the new, healthier template.

AND…..in that process……what you can trust is that your hands are always there to release and receive.

You are always with yourself in your own journey of growth.

Each person is responsible for healing himself, even when the hurts from the past may have been caused by others.

No one can heal another person.

It is the love and support that we provide to each other that gives us the strength to move forward with courage and become whole.

The answers will come in their own time.

Stay with your breath. Stay with yourself.

Place your trust in the only things you really have control over, which are your thoughts, emotions, words, and actions.

Namaste

by Diana Zilly, MS, MA, LCPC, NBCFCH. Diana is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Fellow in Clinical Hypnotherapy, and former Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Joliet Junior College.